


All In Your Head

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Comment Fic 2017 [20]
Category: Thoughtcrimes (2003), Weiß Kreuz
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2017-02-07
Packaged: 2018-09-22 16:38:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9616286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: Written for the fic_promptly prompt: "Thoughtcrimes(/any), Freya, what if Freya had learned to block long before Michael found out about her, and was allowed to leave Brookridge?"Someone at Brookridge teaches Freya how to use her telepathy.





	

His name was Jakob, and he was an orderly, had wild orange hair and cat-like green eyes and the strangest hint of something foreign in his accent when he spoke to Freya. He never bothered her, never tried to take her books, spoke politely to her while he was cleaning. _Can you put your feet up for a second? Thanks._  
  
Freya liked him because he didn’t treat her like a child, didn’t treat her like an invalid, didn’t treat her like she wasn’t there. She was a person to him.   
  
And then one day he talked to her, crouched down in front of her, gently pushed her book down so he could catch her eye.  
  
“Hey, Freya.”  
  
And all the voices went blessedly, perfectly silent.  
  
He smiled at her. There was a wicked glint in his eyes.  
  
“You - what happened?”  
  
He tilted his head and said, without his lips moving, _I’m shielding your mind from everyone else’s. So we can have a private conversation._  
  
“My mind?”  
  
 _You’re a telepath. Those voices you’re hearing are other people’s minds._  
  
“How?”  
  
 _You think in words, yes? So you hear the words other people think. Try speaking to me with your mind._  
  
Freya took a deep breath and recited, very carefully and clearly in her mind, _Can you hear me now?_  
  
Jakob rocked back on his heels, startled. _Easy, no need to shout._ He laughed softly.  
  
Freya was entranced. The world was quiet. She could hear Jakob breathing, hear her own heart beating.  
  
 _You’re a telepath too,_ she said, and he nodded.  
  
 _Lots of us end up in places like this. It’s my job to help you get out._  
  
Freya darted a nervous glance at the open door. Jakob’s mop was propped up against the wall just inside her room. _You mean we’re going to run away?_  
  
 _It’s not that simple. You need to learn how to shield your mind from others, ignore their mental voices, and reach out to individual people. It takes a long time, and a lot of practice, but I’ll be here, every step of the way._ Jakob smoothed a hand over hers, and Freya actually felt it.  
  
She closed her book and set it aside. _Teach me._  
  
Learning to shield her own mind was tedious and difficult. She had to meditate every day, do mental exercises to first build and then strengthen not one but three sets of shields - core shields, to shield the innermost part of her mind, her core self, impenetrable walls, and then outer shields, which she built link by link, like chainmail armor, so she could hear other people when she wanted, and then her outermost shields, like a flimsy curtain, so she could talk to other people.  
  
Not only did she have to maintain those shields at all times - in her sleep - but she had to learn how to reach into other people’s minds individually, collectively, and not just speak to them and hear them but also manipulate them, so they ignored her or listened to something else or turned away.  
  
Jakob was patient, thorough. Whatever she didn’t understand with words he showed her with pictures, with emotions, with feelings, and she learned to communicate beyond words and pictures, on the deepest levels of the human mind.   
  
And then one day, after Jakob finished his lesson with her, he stood up, fetched his mop and bucket, and sailed out of her room with a single parting shot:  
  
 _You’re ready to go free._  
  
On top of working on her shields and telepathy, Freya had been working with the staff, opening up to them, making eye contact with them, speaking to them. As far as they were concerned, her meds were working great, and as long as she kept on with them, she’d be fine out there in the wide, wide world. She used her telepathy so they didn’t figure out she’d stopped taking her meds as soon as her core shields were built.  
  
Before Jakob was completely out of range - he said they’d work on her long-range telepathy once she was out of Brookridge - he sent her one last message, an image. Him and three other people, standing outside the gates, after dark.  
  
She knew the time he meant, instinctively.  
  
She would be there.  
  
She gathered up her prize possessions - her favorite books, picture of her family - and a week’s worth of clothes, and she walked out the front door at seven that evening. She breezed past the staff and other residents, all of them blind to her presence through the power of her telepathy. She walked down the drive with a spring in her step, head held high.  
  
Jakob was standing on the other side of the gate, wearing his all-white orderly uniform beneath a dark green double-breasted overcoat, hands in his pockets. One of the people with him was a boy, East Asian from the looks of him, young, a teenager, wearing a high-collar jacket and matching pants - some kind of school uniform? The other two men were older, one wearing dark pants and a vest. He had a patch over one eye. The final man wore a pristine white suit and glasses, had spiky dark hair and a polite smile.  
  
“Hello, Miss McAllister,” the man in the suit said. “My name is Brad Crawford. So good of you to join us. Schuldig has good things to say about you.”  
  
 _Schuldig?_  
  
 _No one else knows my real name,_ he said. _Not even Crawford._  
  
“If you’re interested,” Crawford continued, “we have a position for you within our organization, which seeks to foster and guide people with talents like yours.”  
  
Freya prodded at his mind, but he had obsidian-smooth walls, impenetrable and utterly opaque. “You’re all telepaths?”  
  
“Telepathy isn’t the only talent to be had,” Crawford said.  
  
The boy lifted a hand and Freya stared as a coin levitated up off his palm.  
  
“What do you say?” Jakob asked.  
  
Freya eyed them. “Can I go see my family first?”  
  
Crawford’s glasses glinted for a second, making his eyes invisible. “Absolutely. We’re a family-oriented organization. Your mother once counted herself among us.”  
  
“What’s your organization called?” Freya fell into step with them as they turned and walked down the driveway to a dark sedan parked at the curb.  
  
“Eszett.”


End file.
